The Case of the Clamouring Dead
by beesandbrews
Summary: When a black cloud descends over Sherlock, John becomes worried enough to drag him out to Alison Mundy's demonstration of her mediumistic talents in the hopes that proving her a fraud would lift his spirits. He had no way of knowing that a night out at the theatre would lead to a new case, or a disturbing revelation about Moriarty. Contains depictions of graphic violence.
1. Chapter 1

A/N: There are generic references to 'Sherlock' series 1 and 2 and the events and characters depicted in 'Afterlife'. Readers are duly cautioned that they may incur spoilers for both programs. The London borough of Canley is a fictional place, borrowed from 'The Bill'. DS Jack Martella is a character of my own devising, although his aunt Viv was a serving officer at the Sun Hill Police station.

* * *

John walked out of the kitchen and shoved a plate of hot buttered toast under Sherlock's nose.

Sherlock frowned and pushed the plate away with a listless hand. He had retreated into his head and seemed determined to stay there. He hadn't shaved for ten days. He hadn't spoken for a week. Even before he had ceased replying when spoken to, it was clear from his snappish demeanour and general irritability that his mood was descending into a steadily worsening downward spiral. Now he was caught up in a black morass. He barely ate. If he roused himself out of his chair, where he perched like a great, brooding eagle, or off of the sofa, where he reclined, hands folded over his breast and eyes staring sightlessly up at the ceiling, it was to scratch dissonant music from his violin, sometimes for hours, until John had no choice but to leave the flat or risk losing his sanity. He was at his wit's end. He'd thought Sherlock's manic moods were hard to deal with. The depressive episodes were even worse.

"What is this?" Sherlock asked when John resolutely moved the plate back into his line of sight.

"It's toast. You make it by applying heat to bread. It's got butter on it. They get that by separating the cream from cow's milk and then agitating it until the fat globules stick together. The NHS frowns upon butter, but you need fats in your diet to absorb certain vitamins, so I advocate a moderate intake. Now eat it. There's tea in the kitchen as well. Why don't you come in and have some while I make you a proper meal?"

Sherlock tried to push the plate away again. John put it back under Sherlock's nose. Sherlock pushed it away again. "I'm not hungry."

"No," John agreed. "You're starving. You've denied your body so long that it's stopped sending out signals that you need to eat. You look hellish. Your colour is rotten and you need to wash. If a potential client walked in right now they'd walk right back out again because they'd think they'd made a mistake and found your sickroom and not your consulting chamber."

"I need a case!" Sherlock growled. He picked up a piece of toast and looked at it as if he'd rather interrogate it than eat it. "Lestrade won't reply to my texts. He's cut me off from Scotland Yard."

"I know," John said softly. "I spoke to Greg last week. It's been quiet for a change. And even if it hadn't been, the department's been under scrutiny. All of his people have been dealing with paperwork issues preparing for some kind of audit." He chuckled softly. "You should have seen him, Sherlock. He thinks the criminals and the auditors are actually conspiring to keep his team, heads down, in front of their computers."

Hearing that Lestrade was chained to his desk seemed to cheer Sherlock. He bit off the corner of a toast slice and chewed it doggedly. His stomach reacted to the unaccustomed stimulus of food. He pressed his free hand against it as it growled loudly.

"I'll get you some tea." John took a few steps towards the kitchen and then turned back towards Sherlock again. "What would you say to going out in a bit?"

"What for?" Sherlock asked as he wiped crumbs from his fingers and then picked up a second triangle of toast.

"There's a medium in town called Alison Mundy," John replied offhandedly. "She's supposed to be quite good." He forced himself to stay relaxed. It was imperative to stay casual if Sherlock was to snatch, rather than just sniff, the bait.

"A charlatan, you mean," Sherlock said derisively around his toast. "You know that's just cold readings and guided responses." He bowed his head for a moment and then raised it again dramatically. When he spoke, it was with an affected falsetto. "There's a woman standing at your shoulder. Her name starts with the letter J. Do you know someone whose name starts with J?" He switched from one slightly feminine voice to another. "My gran's name was Jane!" he replied to himself tremulously and then nodded as he swapped voices again. "Your gran wants you to know you've made her very proud." He shoved the last of his toast into his mouth and put the plate on the floor before clasping his hands together and then pretending to wipe a tear from his eye. "Oh, thank you! Thank you for telling me exactly what I wanted to hear and validating my self-worth. Charlatan!" Sherlock reiterated in his normal tone of voice.

"Desperate people hoping for comfort," John said as he turned away again before dropping his last breadcrumbs on the water. "Might even be a potential client or two amongst them."

"What sort of client?" Sherlock asked scornfully. "The one who wants to know where Great Uncle Archibald hid the family treasure before he popped his clogs? Really, John. I'll admit to being bored, but I'm not desperate, at least not yet."

John cast his gaze over Sherlock's less than pristine frame. "Uh huh. You haven't left the flat in two weeks. In all that time you haven't touched your experiments. Those agar dishes you prepared and left in the fridge dried up and I had to throw them away. I have it on good authority that the next time you start sawing on your violin at three in the morning, the neighbours are going to riot."

"In case you weren't aware," Sherlock replied, "I've been rehearsing Schumann's emViolin Concerto/em. Ironic given your interest in mediums. It is said that after Schumann died in a lunatic asylum, the violinist Joseph Joachim hid the work away with the blessing of Schumann's widow. It wasn't until the spirit of Schumann's himself demanded its recovery during a séance attended by Joachim's two nieces, was it retrieved from a dusty archive and performed in public."

"Then maybe this is a sign," John said. "You playing the music of a composer who came back from the dead to plead the case for his final work. Maybe someone else out there wants to plead their case, Sherlock. Someone only Alison Mundy can hear."

Sherlock sighed and threw up his hands. "Fine. I'll indulge you, John. But only to stop you from spouting any more outlandish dribble." He glanced around the room, picked up a newspaper and frowned at the date. "Two weeks, you say?"

John nodded.

Sherlock leapt from his chair, and then grabbed the seat back to keep his stiffened legs erect. "I better have breakfast then."

"It's nearly four o'clock," John said.

Sherlock shrugged as if the hour was of little consequence. "Tea, then," he suggested before going to the bathroom to bathe and shave.

* * *

"Hi, I'm Alison. Thank you for coming."

Sherlock sat forward in his seat to get a better view of the main attraction and a spring from the threadbare chair dug into his thigh. The Black Box Theatre was a down-at-the-heels establishment devoted to the cause of 'alternative entertainments'. They specialised in producing plays by writers no one had heard of or 'fresh' interpretations of classics. But their tastes were eclectic and it wasn't uncommon to see a handbill out front advertising exhibitions of prestidigitation or sword swallowing and juggling in addition to drag renditions of emHamlet/em complete with a disco interlude. Alison Mundy fit right in.

She was a bit threadbare as well. A faded blonde woman somewhere in her forties, she looked as if she'd had a difficult life. There were stress-lines cut deep around her eyes. Her clothing, although it was neat, had been mended. The beads that she fingered nervously were polished bits of glass. It was a novel take, he'd grant her that. Unlike most stage mediums, there was no glitz or polish to Alison Mundy.

She smiled at the audience in a self-effacing way. "I'm always nervous at the start of these things, and I have a tendency to rabbit on, so I apologise. I never know who's going to come through or how they're going to behave. Sometimes no one talks to me at all and then I feel a bit stupid."

The audience, the majority of whom appeared to be a motley collection of true believers and seekers, made a collectively sympathetic noise. One woman in the front row reached out to the patrons sitting to either side of her and they clasped hands before bowing their heads, as if they were lending their will to the medium's, supplying an extra jolt of cosmic energy to allow the spirits to pass over from beyond the mystic veil.

On stage, Alison Mundy paced back and forth across the worn boards a couple of times and then she went very still. She cocked her head and then she looked upward sharply. "Hello. No. Please. One at a time." She then smiled again, this time very softly, and knelt. "Hello, darling. No, don't be afraid. What's your name?"

She paused, as if listening, and nodded. "Sasha? That's a very pretty name."

A woman in the third row gasped loudly. The alleged medium ignored the outburst in favour of her one-sided conversation. "This lady right here, you mean?" Her gaze travelled upward as she introduced herself again to another invisible someone, this one was evidently much taller than 'Sasha'. She chuckled and then stood to address the audience. She homed straight in on the woman who had gasped. "Hi. Carolyn?"

The woman rose to her feet on unsteady legs. The man sitting next to her reached out and gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. "I'm Carolyn," she replied in a trembling voice.

Sherlock observed the set-piece with a moderate amount of interest. The woman was an obvious plant. But the rest of the audience was eating it up, watching with wide eyes and open-mouthed astonishment. Even John was watching the drama unfold with rapt attention.

"Carolyn, I've got Sasha with me. She's fine! Although she misses you singing around the house," the medium said. "But she's got a problem and I think you can help her." She waited until the woman nodded before continuing. "Sasha said a lady has been keeping her company since she fell off her bike. The lady is nice, but she's very shouty." The audience tittered nervously as Alison Mundy smiled downwards, presumably at Sasha. "She won't use her indoor voice."

The man sitting next to Carolyn got to his feet and put his arm around her.

On stage there was a further conversational exchange between the two spirits and the medium. "The lady wants to take her away," Alison Mundy said to Carolyn. "But you told Sasha never to go with strangers."

"That's right. We did," Carolyn said. It was clear she was on the verge of tears.

Several other people in the audience reached for hankies or tissues as Sherlock repressed an urge to snort in derision. Still, he had to admit that despite her rather unassuming stage presence, Alison Mundy was a consummate actress. The way she knelt and stood at intervals, tilting her head and occasionally nodding or smiling, as if there were actually other people on the stage with her, was done exceptionally well.

"The thing is," Mundy said, "the lady says she's your mother. She wants to help Sasha cross over."

"She went deaf … working in a warehouse. Would never wear her ear defenders. There was nerve damage and the hearing aids didn't help," Carolyn explained, although no one had asked her about why 'Sasha' had called her mother a 'shouty lady'. She seemed to have forgotten that she was in a theatre, so captivated was she by the supposed manifestation of her departed child and mother.

"She died before Sasha got to know her." Hesitantly Carolyn left her seat and approached the stage. Lights shone down and from his vantage point, Sherlock could see that tears had made her makeup run. "It's your granny, Sash. The noisy lady is your granny." She wiped at her face with a recently manicured hand and said, "Your Daddy and I love you very much, but it's okay, darling. It's okay to go with your granny."

Mundy said something too soft for the microphone to pick up and then she waved goodbye. "They've gone. They're at peace now."

Carolyn broke down completely and began to sob. Her partner hastily got up from his seat and escorted her out of the theatre.

Sherlock barely restrained the urge to applaud. He glanced over at John. His face was a study in concentration, as if he was attempting to work the angles and failing. Finally he glanced over. "Plant?" he whispered uncertainly.

Sherlock smiled, pleased to see John wasn't as credulous as he had first seemed. The audience around them was murmuring uncertainly as, on stage, the medium seemed to be centring herself for the next ghostly visitation.

She shook her head several times and then she turned sharply to her left. "Hello." Mundy looked up and held out her hand. If there had actually been someone else with her they would have stood about six feet three inches tall. "I'm very pleased to meet you." She listened intently for a few seconds and then smiled and nodded. "I see. Then I'll respect his wishes and not use his name. I don't want to make him any more uncomfortable than necessary."

She looked straight at Sherlock. "Excuse me, sir?"

Well this was an unexpected turn, Sherlock thought to himself. He wondered if John had arranged it, and if he too, had been acting since they had taken their seats in the run-down theatre.

"Your Uncle Sherrinford's been worried about you. He said it's good you got out of the flat. Even if it was only to be amused by me." She cocked her head and then gave another self-depreciating smile. "He says this isn't a repeat of your tenth birthday."

Sherlock repressed the urge to react. On his tenth birthday his parents had hired Marvo the Magician to entertain at the party. Marvo had astounded the audience, both adults and children, with his apparently amazing powers of clairvoyance. Sherlock hadn't know it then, but it had been his first introduction to the art of cold reading.

He smiled back at the medium, wondering just what revelations she had up her sleeve. He didn't know when she had managed it, but somehow Alison Mundy must have researched him. He'd never mentioned Sherrinford Holmes to John. "No donkey in a red sombrero then?" he retorted. "I must confess, I feel somewhat relieved."

The audience tittered nervously.

Alison Mundy tipped her head in her listening pose and then replied to the alleged spirit of Sherlock's uncle. "All I can do is try." She looked back at Sherlock. "Your uncle has a message for you. He says he's worried about the company you're keeping."

Sherlock felt John flinch. Alison Mundy must have seen his reaction as well. She put up a hand and shook her head. "No, I'm sorry. I wasn't clear. He wasn't referring to you. He says, despite your rather violent tendencies, he approves of your relationship with his nephew. He says you're a steadying influence. No, it's the Irish lad he doesn't approve of. He says you bring out the worst in each other and as much as you enjoy the great game, no good will come of it. People, other people, will always get caught up in the middle and be hurt. It'd be much better for everyone, especially for your friend, if you'd just walk away this time."

John leapt to his feet. "I don't know who put you up to this, lady, but that's enough!"

"John!" Sherlock tugged at John's wrist, reinforcing his verbal command. "Sit down!" Despite the sudden and unexpected turn of events, he was enjoying himself. Ushers were coming down the aisle and they were in danger of being ejected from the theatre. "I said, emsit down/em." Sherlock pulled John back into his seat just as the first usher reached their row.

"It's all right," Alison Mundy said to both the audience and the ushers who were looking uncertainly at John. "Sometimes emotions at these events can run a little high. This can be a lot to take in. Especially for a sceptic."

She focused that sweet smile of hers on John. "Your protectiveness of your friend does you credit," she said. "But I assure you that I'm just a messenger and no one, at least not here or now, means either of you any harm." The rise and fall of her shoulders as she shrugged was apologetic. "I'm afraid that's all I have from your uncle." She frowned at Sherlock as she shook her head. "I'm sorry. He's moved on."

Sherlock was thoughtful as he watched the rest of the performance. If John hadn't fed Alison Mundy information about him, then who had?

* * *

Alison put her cup aside and sighed contentedly. She was enjoying her stay in London. Her appearances at the Black Box had been well attended, and apart from the outburst by the man Sherrinford Holmes had called 'John', there had been no unpleasantness. Carolyn and her husband Bill had been lovely people, thankful to know their little girl was safe on the other side with Carolyn's mother. There was a private sitting, the primary reason she had come to London, to prepare for later. She hoped that it would go well, and that the grieving family would find peace in its aftermath.

She felt a presence at her shoulder and looked up, expecting to see the server who had been so kind to her earlier. There was a man. A man who looked down on her with pain-filled eyes. His hands were covered in blood. More blood pooled at his feet. He spoke in a raspy voice, as if he couldn't get enough air. "Help me, please!"

Alison did the only reasonable thing under the circumstances. She screamed. And then she caught hold of herself. This wasn't the time or the place to lose her head. This man, whoever he was, needed her help. She rose from her chair to help him to sit. All that blood. It was amazing he could stand at all, let alone speak. She guided him into the spot opposite her and without regard for the mess it would make of her clothes or her hands, she pressed him down onto the chair. "Someone help! Please! Someone call an ambulance!"

A server dropped a plate and then swore. The people at the next table stared at Alison as if she was mental. "What's the matter with you?" she demand. No one else reacted. No one picked up their phone to dial for help or rushed over with clean towels or a first aid kit. No one was doing anything at all but staring back blankly. And then the sickening feeling stole over Alison. Slowly she turned back to look properly at the bleeding man.

"I'm sorry," she said both to the room at large and especially to him. He was of no age to have something so terrible happen. Not that torture was appropriate at any age, but to have his life cut short so brutally seemed especially awful. "I'm so sorry." She smiled apologetically at the people at the next table. It wasn't their fault they hadn't seen a dead man. "I'm Alison," she said to the spirit. She used a quiet, polite tone. "How can I help you?"

Alison listened closely. It was difficult to make sense of what he was trying to say, he was as hysterical as she had been upon first observing him. She made soothing, nonsensical noises to calm him down. She told him she would go to the police, even though she was uncomfortable with the idea. Her previous track record with the constabulary in Bristol was spotty at best. But it was better to be thought of as a crank rather than turn a blind eye to suffering, so she persisted, working in the occasional direct question into her calming patter, unaware the proprietress of the café was dialling 999 and a waitress had just run out onto the street to flag down the two constables who had just passed by on their routine foot patrol.

* * *

"Sherlock, your phone is ringing." John looked up from his computer. He'd been trying to write up a case in such a way that it wouldn't get him sued within an inch of his life for libel, but it wasn't really working. It looked as if the story of emThe MP, the Boa Constrictor, and the Two-Way Mirror/em was another one for his private files rather than something he could share with his readers.

"You get it," Sherlock replied without looking up from his laptop's screen. He lobbed the mobile at John with one hand as he typed with the other.

John growled under his breath as he caught the handset. He glanced down at the flashing number and didn't recognise it. He punched the 'answer' button anyway. "Sherlock Holmes's phone. John Watson speaking." He listened for a few moments and then said, "Hang on a second." He put his hand over the speaker. "Sherlock, it's the Desk Sergeant at Sun Hill police station. She says they have someone over there who's insisting on talking to you."

"Oh?" Sherlock paused tapping buttons, but he didn't look up. "Who's that?"

"You're not going to believe it," John teased.

"Tell me or don't, John, I'm busy."

John shrugged, aware he had the Desk Sergeant waiting for a reply and she probably had better things to to do than hang about while they sparred. "It's Alison Mundy, the medium from last night. She had a minor meltdown in a café this morning and caused a disturbance. She says a man has been killed and he wants your help finding his murderer."

Sherlock slammed the lid down on his laptop. He gave John an expectant look as he leapt out of his chair and strode across the room for his coat. "Well, what are you waiting for? Tell the police we'll be down directly!"

* * *

They had put Alison in an interview room. It was a small bland space that smelt of old sweat and disinfectant. They had also given her a cup of strong, sweet tea. She was grateful for that. The constables who had detained her could have taken her straight to hospital for a psych evaluation. If unfamiliar doctors got a hold of her it was possible that they'd throw away the key in the interest of public safety and the bloodied young man – she still didn't know his name – would never get help. Still, she was aware that outside the door they were arguing about what to do with her after an officer from CID had come down and taken a statement and then gone away again.

She'd been as cooperative as she could be, explaining who she was and what her particular gift – if you could call it that – was. And why she was in London. She apologised for the disturbance in the café.

The detective sergeant– a harried looking man named Jack Martella – had patted Alison's hand and said if it'd been him, he'd have jumped straight out of his chair. But it wasn't clear if he was humouring her or taking her seriously. His face gave nothing away as he wrote down a description of a sandy-blond haired man in his thirties, roughly five foot eight, or nine inches in height, with a tattoo of a rose on his left forearm and a scar shaped like a W on his right cheek, who was bleeding from his wrists and feet.

Then DS Martella had asked about who they should contact to collect her. The young man had rasped 'Sherlock Holmes. I need to speak to Sherlock Holmes.' Alison had thought that odd. Sherlock Holmes had been at the demonstration the night before. He was the one with the uncle called Sherrinford and the stocky blond companion the uncle referred to as 'John', although he'd asked Alison not to name either when she spoke to them.

Alison hated to presume on the kindness of strangers, especially ones who she had little doubt were sceptics, but she did as she was bid and asked for Holmes. Now it was a matter of waiting to see who next came through the door; the haughty young man and his hot-headed companion from the Black Box or uniformed officers to take her away to hospital.

* * *

The Sun Hill police station was in the borough of Canley in the East End, north of the Thames. It took the taxi just under half an hour to get there from Baker Street. During the ride, Sherlock sat erect instead of slouching against the seat back, taking in the passing cityscape with a keen eye. Despite the unusual circumstances of their summons to the police station, or perhaps because of it, he seemed unusually alert. His old fire had returned.

John was glad of it. During their time together he'd seen Sherlock's mood swing precipitously between high and low, but so far the low periods hadn't lasted for more than a few days. A two week period of doldrums, that showed little sign of lifting on its own, had become seriously worrying. Enough so he had been on the verge of contacting Mycroft to ask if Sherlock had experienced long term episodes of depression before. That was until he'd seen the advert in the back of the free newspaper for Alison Mundy's appearance at the Black Box and decided, out of a sense of desperation, to make one more attempt to entice Sherlock out of the flat on his own.

Sherlock had been both riveted by Alison Mundy's demonstration and vexed. He couldn't determine her angle or motive for deceiving her audience. He'd been so intrigued he insisted that they follow her after the performance to see where she was staying. They ended up at a small hotel that catered to travellers on a modest budget. All appearances suggested that Alison Mundy wasn't into the supernatural for a profit. Unless, John speculated, she was playing a long game, and the down-at-the-heels affectation was just set-dressing to help convince her marks that her altruism was sincere.

As for himself, John was equally perplexed by what he had witnessed. It was possible that the theatre's patrons had been salted with shills to guarantee the spirits would be reunited with their grieving loved ones. That would have made a good show. It was also possible that, like Sherlock, Alison Mundy was particularly adept at cold reading, picking up clues about the people in the audience from their appearance and body language.

But there was no way she could have known about Sherlock's uncle Sherrinford unless she'd researched the Holmes family. Until the performance, John hadn't even know that Sherlock emhad/em an uncle Sherrinford. Sherlock didn't speak of his family, ever, and there were no family photos amongst the eclectic collection of objects Sherlock had scattered over their living space.

She'd hit the nail with uncanny accuracy when speaking to the rest of the audience members as well. One or two plants would have been reasonable. A dozen in an audience of fifty beggared belief. John had left the Black Box feeling unnerved.

Alison Mundy was a puzzle. And in lieu of a juicy murder, that was exactly what Sherlock needed to rouse him from his funk. But there had to be more to the self-effacing woman than met their eyes, John was sure of it. He felt the calm of battle descend over him as the taxi pulled up in front of the Sun Hill nick.

* * *

DS Jack Martella looked around the CID office and blew out a disheartened breath. He was the second generation of Martellas to work out of Sun Hill, his aunt Viv had risen through the ranks from beat constable to DC. She'd been shot during a traffic stop and killed in a random act of violence that had stunned everyone. When they broke the news to his family Jack had resolved, when he was old enough, that he'd take her place. But there were times when he wished he'd followed his Uncle Paolo into the priesthood instead. If he'd become a priest he'd not have to pay alimony to a demanding ex-wife, and when someone came into to his office babbling of ghosts, he'd have two thousand years of papal instructions to fall back on.

He picked up the case file and felt guilty for exploiting a possible out. As a rule Jack wasn't keen on private investigators. They had their place tracking down husbands and wives who would rather do a bunk than deal with their no longer beloved spouses, or performing routine legwork on other civil matters. But when it came to doing real police work, they had a maddening tendency to get underfoot. An overwhelming case load, complicated by persistent budget cuts and performance evaluations, meant that no one had time to indulge well-meaning civilians. Not when there was someone higher up the chain of command breathing down their collective necks looking for an excuse to complain.

But in this case, Jack was happy to make an exception. Alison Mundy was a problem and a puzzler and he suspected that no matter what he did – if he took her seriously and opened an enquiry based on her statement, or if he packed her off to a loony bin – someone, probably the DCI, was going to question his judgement.

He greeted Sherlock Holmes and his companion Dr John Watson with a warm handshake and ushered them both into a conference room. Holmes seemed perfectly at ease with the unusual circumstances surrounding his request to attend at the police station. He had a firm grip, and his hands weren't as soft as his rather expensive clothes suggested they might be. "Thank you both for coming." He turned to John. "Are you a medical doctor or the other kind?"

"GP these days, why?" Dr Watson replied.

Jack took a deep breath and let it out again. "It's this Alison Mundy woman. I don't know what to make of her. Ever since the constables brought her in … I'd swear she was disturbed. Schizophrenic. Bi-Polar. One or the other and off her meds. But she's given us some potentially credible information and the description of a man who's on our missing persons list." He shrugged wearily, trying not to think about paperwork and ticking clocks. Everything these days was on a countdown. "It's possible that she's witnessed something. Been traumatised and had a delayed reaction maybe. And this is her way of coping."

He shook his head, feeling as green and inexperienced as the day he'd interviewed for CID and the Superintendent had slapped a file down in front of him and asked how to approach the investigation. "Then she insisted on seeing you, Mr Holmes. Or rather she says the man with her has done."

"And does this man have a name?" Holmes asked.

Jack shook his head again. He gave Holmes a bemused smile. "She says the recent dead are often so traumatised it's hard to get basic information out of them."

"Ah." Holmes pressed his lips together in an expression of irritation. "No different from the living, then."

DC Denali entered, bearing Alison Mundy's witness statement. Sherlock Holmes made an impatient noise. Jack had a headache. He wanted Alison Mundy done and dusted and out of his nick. He handed the file straight over.

Holmes scanned the document rapidly. As he read through it his expression darkened.

"The man you mentioned. The missing person. Is his name by chance Declan Waters? And is he employed as a taxi driver?"

Jack nodded. "That's right. How did you know that?"

Dr Watson looked over at his companion. "Sherlock?"

"Declan Waters is known to me," Holmes replied cryptically. He turned to Dr Watson. "I think we'll all have a word with Alison Mundy."

* * *

"So, Ms Mundy – " Sherlock said as he swept into the interview room and dropped into a chair across from their witness. "– we meet again."

"Hello, Sherlock." Alison Mundy toyed with her beads for a moment. "That's an unusual name, Sherlock. It's very distinctive. Just like your uncle's name, 'Sherrinford' and your brother 'Mycroft'. Your family likes unusual names. Is that why your uncle didn't want me to use it last night? So that you would be less likely to be recognised in public?"

She rattled her thoughts off one after another. Sherlock did that sometimes when he had so much going on his head he had to let some of it out or burst. John wondered if Alison was the same way.

"You know each other?" DS Martella said. He sounded even more perplexed than he had during their initial consultation.

"We attended a demonstration of Ms Mundy's mediumistic gifts last night. It was most interesting," Sherlock replied.

Alison leant forward and regarded Sherlock curiously. "And yet you're still not a believer." Her gaze travelled upward until it appeared she was looking at someone standing behind Sherlock's right shoulder. "I'm sorry, I didn't catch that. Say it again?" She listened carefully and then nodded. "Your uncle said to remind you, if you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth."

The colour drained from Sherlock's already pale face. For a few seconds he was noticeably discomfited and then he visibly composed himself. He cleared his throat and then replied, "Touché."

John's gaze darted from Sherlock's face to Alison Mundy's, eager to see how she would react. He didn't see what he expected he might. She wasn't gloating. She wasn't even looking at Sherlock. She had turned her body away to face the empty chair at her left. She was engaged in a soft, one-sided conversation with someone only she could see.

Sherlock apparently decided that he wanted to play along. "You! In the chair! If you want me to help you then I need facts, not histrionics. What is your name?"

DS Martella's mouth fell open in surprise. Alison reached out and patted an invisible shoulder.

"Stop mollycoddling him!" Sherlock snapped. "If he wants me to catch whoever did this to him then he needs to pull himself together. Name!"

Alison Mundy looked daggers at Sherlock but she replied. "Declan. He says his name is Declan. Declan Waters. He says you helped him once before. That's why he's asking for you now."

"That's better," Sherlock said. "Now. Tell me what happened."

Not quite sure that he believed what he was witnessing, John opened his notepad and took down the name. He looked up to see that, once again, the alleged medium was listening intently to their new and apparently invisible client.

"It's sketchy. He said he was out for a walk on the towpath near his flat. It was after his shift. He likes to walk after being in the taxi all day. There was the sound of footsteps running... a jogger." She shook her head. "Everything went black."

"And then?" Sherlock demanded.

Alison's face twisted in agony. "Pain. Oh God. The pain." She looked up at them in horror. "His eyes are covered so he can't see. He's been put in a cell ... behind bars. He remembers the clang of the door shutting. He's chained up, 'round his ankles and there are shackles on his wrists. They whip him. And when they do they chant 'In pain there is beauty.' Two voices. A man and a woman. He thinks they sound familiar, but he can't place them."

"You said when he appeared to you in the café he was bleeding," Sherlock prompted.

"What about your hands and feet?" She tried very hard not to grimace, taking a deep breath through her nose and letting it out slowly. For a moment it looked as if she might faint. "Spikes. Metal spikes. Through his wrists and ankles. He's hanging by them. His body weight is distributed wrong. It makes it hard to breathe." Alison took a laboured breath. It was as if her lungs were somehow restricted and they couldn't properly expand.

"Where?" Sherlock demanded. "Where is this taking place?"

Alison rocked back and forth several times and then slumped to the table with her head cradled in her hands. "I can't. I'm sorry. It's so awful."

There was a female constable watching the interview from the doorway. Without being asked, she exited and came back a few moments later with a cup of tea. Martella thanked her and then offered it to Alison, cupping her hand with his as he helped her to drink. He said something too soft for John to catch and then after he straightened, he tipped his head towards the door, indicating they should leave the room.

"Well?" he said when the door closed behind them. "Do you believe her?"

Sherlock's face was closed. John had the impression that he was impressed by the medium's testimony, despite his inclination to be otherwise. "Yes," he replied. "Or rather I believe that she believes. You can leave the matter in my hands, Sergeant. If it becomes a police matter, I'll let you know."

* * *

"Don't tell me you're buying into this." John rushed after Sherlock as he swept out of the taxi and down the street, heading towards the river towpath where Declan Waters was known to take his nightly walks.

"Declan Waters is missing. That's a fact," Sherlock said. "No one has seen or heard from him, other than Ms Mundy, for a fortnight. According to his sister, with whom he shares his flat, he put chicken and potatoes on to roast in the oven, went out for his nightly walk, and that was that."

Supposedly thousands of people went missing every year. Sometimes under similar circumstances. Usually, when they did, it was under their own steam. John could understand why the police hadn't exactly made a major effort investigating the disappearance. "He's someone you knew?"

They veered around a delivery van that was parked half on the pavement. Sherlock waited for John to catch up and then he replied. "He brought me a case once. He had an arrangement with an elderly woman. Every Sunday he would pick her up from her home and drive her to church, and then when the service was over, he would drive her home again. This went on for some months. One Sunday, the woman was waiting in her garden as she always did. There was only one problem. Although the lady was dressed as she always was, in a large hat and heavy, old-fashioned veil, he recognised that it wasn't the same woman, even though her family members acted as if it was. He thought that was odd and so he came to me."

"And you investigated?" John said as they reached the steps that would lead them to the last known location of Declan Waters.

"I investigated," Sherlock replied. "It turned out the old woman had died. But her family didn't want that to be known because of a clause in her will that said she would have to reside with them for a minimum of ten years if they were to inherit. They put her body in the cellar to preserve it and hired an imposter to keep up the pretence that she was still alive."

"It wasn't murder?"

Sherlock shook his head. "Just an inconvenient natural death. But unlike most people, Declan Waters was observant enough to spot the substitution. A lot of other people, including the vicar at the church, hadn't. If it's Declan's ghost speaking to Alison Mundy, then with proper focusing, he'll be observant enough to help us find his killer."

Despite its rather grubby views, the towpath was popular with local joggers and dog walkers. Worse yet, it had rained several times in the intervening two weeks since Declan Waters' disappearance. John didn't see how even Sherlock's eagle eyes could pick up any decent clues or trace evidence that might set them firmly on a proper investigative path.

"But what if it's not his ghost, Sherlock?" John asked, giving voice to the fear that had nagged him since they'd first walked into the interview room. "What if this is some kind of elaborate set-up to discredit you. Or worse, lure you into a trap?"

"Then they, whoever 'they' are, are extremely clever people and I want to meet them. I'd also like to congratulate them on their research skills. Their intelligence on my uncle Sherrinford has been unparalleled," Sherlock replied. He entered the mouth of the tunnel below an overpass and then knelt to examine the area more closely. He flicked the beam of a penlight against the concrete walls of the tunnel and then used it in combination with his magnifier to search the ground.

"I admit someone could have paid the theatre to book Alison Mundy and then bribed her to feed me information. But how did they know that I could be talked into attending the demonstration?" Sherlock straightened and put his penlight and magnifier away. "No, John. If someone had sent me the tickets, or given them to you – a nurse at the clinic you've been attending, or even one of those street touts theatres sometimes use – your fears might have some weight."

He froze for a moment and then, using a handkerchief, removed something from the dirt at his feet. He held the object aloft. It was a gold medallion.

"What is that?" John asked.

"A St Christopher's medal." Sherlock peered at it through his magnifier. "There's engraving on the back ... Initials ... 'DW'. Not conclusive proof, but it does make Ms Mundy's story more compelling."

He glanced around the area at large, as if he was reconstructing events on the night Declan Waters had disappeared. "John, stand there." John walked a short distance down the tunnel and then stood. Sherlock retreated even further back into its depths and then called out his next instruction. "Now start walking."

John walked as if he was a man out on his nightly stroll. Not too fast, not too slow. A few moments later he heard the sound of footsteps. A jogger. He ignored them as he supposed Declan Waters had. Joggers weren't anything to be afraid of, as long as you weren't directly in their way, and the towpath was wide enough for three abreast. The steps grew closer, nearly behind him. He walked on, wondering just what Sherlock had up his sleeve. A cloth over his mouth most likely. That would explain the St Christopher's medal, if the chain it was carried on broke during a struggle.

The hand between John's shoulder blades caught him off-guard. Before he could react, he hit the ground. He lay there, stunned. Gasping for air and laid out on his belly, John wondered how one second he could be upright and in the next out flat. The attack had occurred so quickly that there had barely been time to throw his arms out and break his fall.

Seconds later, Sherlock was there. He offered John a hand and helped him to his feet. He wrapped a solicitous arm around John's shoulders. Still reeling from his sudden meeting with the earth, John was helpless to protest as Sherlock half walked- half carried him out onto the street and presumably to his horrific death.

"You think there was a van parked there?" John wheezed as he worked to get his lungs functioning again.

"Car or van." Sherlock glanced around. "Once initially disabled, it would have then been easy for the killer to incapacitate his victim completely." He glanced upward at the CCTV camera mounted at the mouth of the tunnel. The lens had been painted over. John made a mental note to ask DS Martella about it. There was no telling how long the camera had been out of service, but it was possible that the initial kidnap had been recorded.

A rough looking man sauntered towards them, a bottle of cider in hand. Sherlock smiled in recognition and hurried towards him. Limping on bruised knees and starting to feel the sharp sting of abraded palms, John followed.

"Reg. A word?" Sherlock called.

Reg looked about fifty, although as far as John knew, he could have just as easily been thirty-five. He wore a duffel coat, even though the day wasn't nearly cold enough to warrant such a heavy jacket, over khaki fatigues. He had several days growth of beard that was liberally salted with grey. He was bald under his battered trilby hat.

Sherlock offered cash to pass the word, and more cash as incentive to whoever came up with the goods. Homeless network activated, he bid Reg good day and went in search of a taxi to take them back to Sun Hill police station and then onto Baker Street.

* * *

Alison stretched out on her dollhouse-sized bed in her postage stamp-sized room and sighed with relief. She put her hands over her face, blocking out the lamp light that came streaming through the window. She was tired and felt emotionally strung out from dealing with the traumatised ghost and the police. She needed a drink to blunt the raw feeling, but there wasn't time. She was meant to do a reading for Mr and Mrs Buhari, the couple who had paid for her to come to London in the first place. They were hoping to contact their daughter Alicia, who had died a year ago on the anniversary of her birth. If she was to be coaxed through the veil, there was no better day for it, but in her current state, Alison wasn't sure she wanted to make the attempt. Spirits sometimes took advantage of mediums who weren't in full control of their powers, and at the moment, the grip she had on hers was tenuous at best.

Though she felt guilty about it, she was glad Declan Waters had fled, back to his body most likely. Although he could just as easily be following Sherlock Holmes, attempting to guide him to the truth even though Sherlock couldn't see him. The detective was an unusual man. Alison had heard some of the police constables talking about him while they were trying to sort out what to do with her. He was a genuine eccentric; high strung and temperamental, but too brilliant and intuitive to be dismissed. He'd solved several difficult cases and rubbed the Met's collective nose in them, just because he could. Despite his arrogant ways, or perhaps because of them, his Uncle Sherrinford kept a close watch, but not nearly as close as that of Sherlock's companion, the prickly Dr John Watson.

Alison wasn't sure what to make of John. Sherrinford called him Sherlock's 'guard dog' and said he was protective and loyal to a fault. He seemed unusually defensive over their relationship. He'd practically leapt out of his chair at the public reading when she'd passed on the comment Sherrinford had made about not liking the company Sherlock kept. At the time, Alison had found that odd, but more than one of the constables had referred to John as Sherlock's 'partner' and it didn't sound as if they speaking in a business sense. Perhaps that was why he was so touchy.

The next time they met up, Alison decided, she would make a point to try and get to know the doctor better. Perhaps then he would see that she intended no harm towards Sherlock and he, in turn, might calm down. The matter settled in her mind, Alison rose, deciding that since the hotel's management had managed to cram a bathtub into the tiny space in the next room then she would take advantage of a soak in warm water to prepare herself for the séance.

* * *

Sherlock was contemplating a map tacked to the wall over the sofa when John came out of the bath. He was tracing lines, probable escape routes from the towpath, most likely, and frowning.

He glanced over as John went to confirm his hypothesis. But rather than asking something civilised like 'feel better?', especially since he had been the one to inflict the injury, Sherlock began to rattle off a gruesome litany of facts on the subject of crucifixion.

"Did you know, John, that unlike popular portrayals, convicts were nailed to their crosses just above their wrists, through the space between the radius and the ulna, rather than through their palms? And that a small bench called a sedile was often mounted to the cross as well, so that the condemned could sit down occasionally to relieve the agonising pain, only to paradoxically prolong their suffering?"

"Uh, not really, no," John replied.

"And that quite often one of the causes of death was the organs crushing down on one another, compression of the lungs, for example, leading to asphyxia. Don't you find that significant?"

Their alleged ghostly client had complained of difficulty breathing. He'd also mentioned that there were spikes through his wrists and ankles. "It lends a certain degree of weight to some of the things Alison Mundy said Declan Waters told her, I guess," John admitted.

"Other possible causes of death included cardiac rupture, heart failure, hyporvolemic shock, acidosis, arrhythmia, or pulmonary embolism." Sherlock seemed quite cheerful as he shared his research, completely failing to notice that once again, he hadn't taken into account that his audience might be less than enraptured by his findings. "Of course there was also the potential for death by dehydration or sepsis, depending on environmental conditions, or if the subject had been tortured beforehand."

John had been hungry when he'd got out of his bath. Now he felt faintly nauseated at Sherlock's enthusiasm as he detailed potential causes of death. "And the people who took Declan Waters thought his suffering was beautiful. Lovely people he got mixed up with. So what are you looking at?" John asked, hoping to shift the subject onto something less grisly.

"We've potentially determined how Declan was taken," Sherlock said. "If, during our demonstration earlier, I had only knocked you to your knees, then a foot applied firmly to your back when you were stunned would have effectively knocked the rest of the air out of your lungs, incapacitating you. Then a piece of gaffers' tape over your mouth and tie wraps round your wrists and ankles, and you'd be completely immobilised. Declan was a slight man and not especially fit; a little taller than you at five foot nine inches, but he weighed half a stone less. He'd have been easy to bundle into the boot of a car or into the back of a van. An iron-barred cage," Sherlock mused, rapidly switching mental gears. "Where, short of building one of those yourself, would you find one?"

John shrugged. "Storeroom where they had to lock up valuable goods? Furrier or an old bank with a lock up for deposit boxes? I don't know. Sherlock, isn't this all pointless speculation? We haven't got a body, and a ghost is hardly a credible witness. Who is this Alison Mundy person, anyway? I assume you've checked up on her."

Sherlock gave John a disappointed look. "Of course I've looked into her, John. Alison Mundy, currently from Bristol, originally from Manchester. Formerly a nurse, she makes a modest living doing public readings like the one we attended, but as a medium, she accepts no fees other than meals and transportation to and from out of town engagements. Her primary means of support are government benefits and compensation received for injuries sustained during a train derailment that put her in and out of hospital for the better part of a year. She's no stranger to the psychiatric ward, if you were going to ask. Her habit of replying to the voices in her head did not go unnoticed. Additionally, I have it on good authority, that she's assisted the police more than once, although there was one instance where she was considered a person of interest in a murder enquiry for a brief time before being completely exonerated."

"You believe her," John said. "Even that stuff about your uncle."

Sherlock shrugged. "At this point, John, she's not given me a reason to do anything but take her at her word."

* * *

Jack looked down at the evidence-bagged Saint Christopher medal and the accompanying fingerprint analysis verifying it had once belonged to Declan Waters and got a sour feeling in his gut. It wasn't concrete evidence of foul play, but it was proof that something had happened to the missing cab driver on the night he was last seen. His sister had sworn he'd been wearing the medal around his neck when he'd left their flat.

As a result, despite the current state of the camera, he'd requested the CCTV records and was now waiting to see if there was anything useful to be obtained from them. If the towpath was on Declan Waters' usual nightly route then maybe, even if his kidnap hadn't been recorded, there would be a meeting or evidence of something shady, something that would give them critical insight into a crime that from where Jack sat, had no motive to be committed.

In the meantime, all he could do, other than quietly authorise a new house to house enquiry, was to let the constables tasked with going through the hours of video get on with their job.

And wait.


	2. Chapter 2

"You have a lovely home," Alison said as she was ushered into the modest flat of Samuel and Alma Buhari. The walls were decorated with family photographs and framed needlepoint Bible quotations. Pink party balloons were tied in bunches. They floated over a table filled with gifts for the youngest member of the clan, the daughter left behind after her mother died giving her life.

She was introduced to half a dozen extended family members, aunts and uncles and cousins whose names quickly blurred together. Alison felt guilty about her inattentiveness, but she was still distracted by her earlier experiences, even though she had tried hard to box them up tight. She had left the case of Declan Waters in good hands. Now it was time to do what she could for someone else.

A young man picked up the baby and brought her forward. They hadn't yet been introduced, but by the numerous photographs, Alison surmised that this was Jacob Aguda, Alicia's husband.

He confirmed her assumption a moment later by introducing himself. "And this is Lydia."

The infant gurgled and waved her hands. Alison smiled down upon her and saw echoes of her mother in the child's liquid brown eyes and dimpled smile. "She's very pretty," Alison said.

"She takes after her mother, lucky girl, not her great oaf of a father," Jacob replied with a self-depreciating smile. He sighed. "I know Alicia is in a better place, but I wish she could be here to see what a beautiful child we made." He sighed again. "I miss her so." He played with his daughter's chubby fingers for a moment and then looked at Alison with worry in his eyes. "This séance, is it right?" he asked.

"How do you mean?" Alison watched as Jacob struggled to frame his misgivings into something that wouldn't be offensive.

"Alicia has gone to a better place, and yet we call her back to us. Isn't it us who's meant to go to her? When it's our time, I mean."

Jacob had a point. Alicia wasn't in the room. She hadn't clung onto the mortal world to watch over her husband and child. She had crossed over, apparently confident that they would be looked after by her extended family. Alison hesitated, considering her reply. "Your in-laws, Samuel and Alma, they need this chance to say goodbye properly to Alicia. They need to let her know that you and your daughter are coping. She made them promise."

"But can't she look down on us and see that?" Jacob asked. He fussed with one of the pink bows attached to his daughter's tiny cornrows until Lydia began to scrunch her face and wave her chubby arms, making it clear she had picked up on her father's distress. She was on the verge of crying.

Alison cooed at Lydia get her to settle. "She can. She probably does, although I don't sense her with us now. There's no guarantee that the séance will be successful. Sometimes the dead don't answer our calls. But Samuel and Alma need to tell themselves that they tried."

"And what about Lydia?" Jacob held his daughter close against his chest. "Is it safe for her? Should a baby be around wandering spirits?"

That was a question that Alison had been asking herself since she saw the child. She'd had bad experiences in the past when spirits had been attracted to children. Having Lydia in the flat, even if it was with the best of intentions, made her uncomfortable. Now she could see that the child's father shared her misgivings. "It might be best if you took her away." Alison looked around the room chocked-full of photographs of parent and child. "If Alicia comes she'll be able to see how well you are. You may feel her presence tonight. Don't be afraid if you do. Tell her, though, that you are happy and well. And that you miss her. Can you do that?"

Jacob nodded. He glanced over at Samuel and Alma. They were standing by the refreshment table, deep in conversation with an elderly woman whose name had escaped Alison's mind. "Will you tell them?"

Alison nodded back and put her arm around Jacob's beefy shoulder. "Come on, we'll tell them together."

* * *

Of course a word had been dropped in Mycroft's ear. John tried not to grimace as the elder Holmes brother glanced at Sherlock's accumulation of research pinned against the wall and then gave his brother a disapproval-filled scowl. "If you're this bored, I'm sure I could scare something up for you to do at the Foreign Office."

Sherlock glowered back. "Keep your spy rings to yourself, brother. I'm perfectly capable of keeping myself entertained."

Mycroft looked down his nose at Sherlock reclining at his ease with his violin in hand. Prior to being interrupted, he'd been plucking out a new tune, something decidedly more cheerful than the endless repetition of the Schumann piece that had so annoyed the neighbours. "With ghosties and ghoulies and things that go bump in the night?"

"The ghost did lead us to a crime scene," John interjected defensively. There had been a fingerprint on the St Christopher's medal that definitely linked it to Declan Waters. Nothing had come up yet on the CCTV or from Sherlock's homeless network, but it was still early days on those fronts.

Sherlock smiled at the sudden vote of confidence. John gave him a tight-lipped shrug in return. Given a choice, he'd side with Sherlock, no matter how tenuous the situation was, over Mycroft, any day, even if he was reasonably sure that Sherlock was barking mad.

"As long as it doesn't lead you to the front pages," Mycroft warned. "There's only so much damage control I can do for your reputation, dear brother. You do know the woman was made a laughingstock before all of Bristol."

Sherlock made a dismissive hand gesture. "By a journalist with an agenda. Yes, I know. She was then later vindicated completely, by the same journalist, no less, when the suffocation murder she saw actually occurred." He pointed at a clipping on the wall. "I have done my homework, emdear brother/em. But if the worse does come to pass, do feel free to distance yourself from me as rapidly as possible. I promise I won't be offended."

Mycroft's mobile buzzed in his pocket. He removed it, frowned at the display, and headed rapidly for the doorway. "On your own head, be it," he said, and retreated down the steps.

"Isn't it always?" Sherlock shouted back.

The score is tied 1-all, John thought to himself in an announcer's voice. He finished his tea and then took himself to bed, leaving Sherlock hunched in his chair over his violin in a contemplative pose, this time, rather than a brooding one.

* * *

Alison still had misgivings as she joined hands with Samuel and Alma and closed her eyes. She could hear the others, the aunties and the uncles chosen to bear witness, settling nervously around the table. Clearing their throats. Scraping the legs of their chairs against the thin carpet as they made themselves more comfortable. Doing the sorts of things one does when they weren't quite sure of what next to expect. Gradually they settled and the hemming and hawing of nervous people gave way to quieter sounds; the muffled noise of traffic from the street far below and the occasional shuffling of footsteps from the flat above.

A few feet away on a tripod, a digital camcorder was already active, making a record of events so that the grieving family could watch again later. Alison never filmed herself during seances, not even out of a sense of morbid curiosity. She didn't want to know what went on when she was caught up in a mediumistic trance, her consciousness way-laid so that the spirits could communicate directly with their loved ones. Being a helpless conduit frightened her. With the dead ever present, whispering and sometimes shouting in her ears for attention, Alison had trouble enough sleeping. She didn't need another reason to be wary of closing her eyes at night.

She took a deep, cleansing breath, banishing negative thoughts from her mind. She was there to reunite a loving family with their missing child. A child who, through a set of unfortunate circumstances, they were unable to say a proper goodbye to when she abruptly and without warning exchanged one plane of existence for the other. Nothing more. Alison took another breath. And then another. Feeling sufficiently centred, she nodded and Alma began to recite the calling of the spirits ritual in a quavering voice.

Slowly, the heartfelt prayer receded into the background, becoming white noise, as Alison felt herself start to drift...

Everything around her grew hazy.

The chair beneath her insubstantial.

The room non-existent.

The air around her became foggy grey. Then the light seeped completely away and it became blacker than any black imaginable.

She was neither here nor there, betwixt and between one plane of existence and the other.

A white light appeared. A tiny pinprick. Like the first star after sunset.

Alison smiled as a feeling of warmth began to suffuse her body.

All was well.

Gradually the pinprick grew as the veil lifted. More light poured forth. Bright, but not blinding, even though it should have been painful to look at after the darkness of absolute nothingness.

A figure appeared from out of the light. A young woman.

She smiled and started to walk forward.

Alison recognised Alicia Aguda from the photographs. She smiled back and beckoned for her to come closer, all the while trying hard to ignore the tiny frisson of unease that crept along her spine. She concentrated on thinking nothing but warm, welcoming thoughts. Gradually, her innate resistance to being overtaken subsided.

They clasped hands.

They became one entity engulfed by a halo of pure white light.

Surrounded by her loved ones, Alicia began to speak through Alison.

* * *

Frantic banging on the outer door and the shouting of his name could only mean one thing, Sherlock thought with delight. Someone had brought him an urgent case. He flew down the stairs, his feet barely hitting treads, and threw the door open.

Alison Mundy burst into tears at the sight of him.

The couple with her, a man and a woman in their middle fifties, clucked and soothed in the annoying way that well-meaning people often did.

Mrs Hudson stuck a bleary-eyed head out her door. "Sherlock? What's going on?"

"An update on my latest case, I should think," Sherlock replied. "Won't you come upstairs, Ms Mundy?"

"Alison, please."

Alison Mundy had started to visibly calm as soon as she clapped eyes on him. She apologised to the well-meaning people, and after an additional round of assurances that she was 'all right now', they were deposited with a promise to call at a more civilised hour, into a waiting car driven by an evident relation, based on facial similarity and mode of dress. Sherlock dismissed them from his mind. "Go back to bed, Mrs Hudson," he instructed as an afterthought. "I'm sure I can manage."

Mrs Hudson gave Sherlock a doubtful look in reply, but retreated behind her own door.

John was in the living room, rubbing grit from his eyes and looking generally sleep-befuddled. "What's going on?" He turned his frowning gaze on Alison Mundy. "What's she doing here?"

"You need to see this," Alison said insistently as she pulled an envelope from her pocketbook. She thrust the envelope into Sherlock's hands.

He tore it open carefully and looked inside. The envelope contained a micro-SDRAM card. "What's this?"

"I was conducting a séance for the Buhari family. Seances are risky things."

Alison rambled on. Sherlock caught John's eye and suggested that tea might be in order. He pulled a face but retreated to the kitchen as Sherlock settled comfortably in his chair, fitted the memory card into his laptop, and once it had come out of hibernation, selected the only file on the card as he waited for their unexpected guest to say something relevant to his interests.

"Robert used to insist on recordings," Alison said. "I don't do them any more unless the family requests it."

"'Robert' being the late Dr Robert Bridge, psychologist, university lecturer, and Alison's putative biographer, Sherlock mentally clarified as he hit the play icon. Eight nervous looking people – including the couple and the driver who had deposited Alison on his door step – and Alison, clasped hands around a dining table. There was a pillar candle burning and the photograph of a young woman at its centre.

The older woman on Alison's left began to speak, stating the sitters' intentions to commune with the spirit of the dear departed. Sherlock ignored her too. He kept his attention focused on Alison Mundy. She had closed her eyes and appeared to be taking a series of meditative breaths. In and out. Self-hypnosis, Sherlock surmised. She began to rock gently from side to side and then she abruptly stilled. Her eyes opened. The voice with which she spoke held nothing of Alison's normal Mancunian accent. It was, instead, a rich contralto coloured with a hybrid blend of East London and West African influences.

The change was remarkable. Everything about Alison Mundy had been affected. Her posture and body carriage had completely altered. The lines of her face smoothed and the years seemed to fall away until she was young again. Sherlock found himself slightly taken aback. "They speak through you?"

Alison toyed with her beads but nodded an affirmation. "During the trance state, they inhabit me."

John came in rattling a tea tray. He offered Alison a cup, and a seat, something Sherlock had neglected to do in his haste to get to the point of her visit.

On screen-Alison, in a voice not her own, began to speak of a child left behind.

"I take it you didn't bring me this to prove your capacity to unite the grieving with their loved ones."

Alison shook her head. "Skip forward to the fifteen minute mark."

John put down the tray and peered over Sherlock's shoulder as he advanced the playback. "What am I meant to see?"

"Just watch," Alison said.

Sherlock hit play again and watched as the happy family reunion abruptly ended. On the video, Alison drew a sucking breath and then went stiff. When she opened her eyes again they were wild and filled with pain, and then her entire expression became bitter.

Around the séance table the other participants gasped and began to mutter uncertainly. They were shushed and called to order by the couple at the head. "Don't let go," the man said. "If you let go she could die."

Once again Alison's voice changed. This time it was lower and more masculine.

"In pain there is beauty." Alison laughed mirthlessly. "Have you ever heard such rot. Pain is pain. There's no beauty as we hang on the cross, the life crawling out of us as we try to scream and beg for mercy and all we can do is whimper!"

Alison's demeanour changed, the body language became that of someone used to hard work or physical exertion. The voice feminine. The words were coloured heavily with a Polish accent. "They watch us suffer and rejoice."

The upper part of Alison's body whipped back and forth, rocking violently from one side to the other. It was like the spirits were fighting for who would have control of their host.

"Jesus," John gasped softly as Alison was possessed by yet another spirit, a male Central Londoner this time.

"They pick us like flowers. A bloody bouquet."

Abruptly Alison slumped against the table, apparently unconscious. A gust of air blew the party balloons sideways, knocking over the portrait on the table and extinguishing the candle. Evidently, the séance had ended. People rushed to Alison's assistance. They leapt from the table. The front door slammed against the wall, punctuating the chaotic scene with an emphatic exclamation point as someone fled the flat entirely. Sherlock glanced up. Alison Mundy was staring into her teacup.

"There are five of them. Your friend Declan and two other men and two women. They were all taken. All tortured. All killed."

"A serial killer?" John said softly, as if he couldn't quite wrap his head around what he had just witnessed.

"Killers," Alison corrected. "It's a couple. A man and a woman." She shook her head, clearly frustrated. "It's all so muddled." She stared at the empty space and then shouted, "It would help if you'd stop speaking all at once!"

"Which one of you was first?" Sherlock asked. He employed the same brusque technique that had caused Declan Waters to reveal his identity on the theory that what had once been successful with the hysterical dead bore repetition.

"She was." Alison pointed to a spot by the fireplace.

"And does she have a name?"

Out of the corner of his eye, Sherlock watched John heave a sigh and dart for the notepad and pen he'd left on the dining table. He opened it to a fresh page and then waited, pen poised expectantly.

"Marion. She's called Marion," Alison replied. "I can't get a second name. She's very upset. Not from London. Liverpool, by the accent. She's a young girl, around eighteen. Red hair cut short. About five feet four or five. Pretty."

"Who was taken next?" John asked. He was flat voiced and impersonal. Whatever his misgivings were about Alison Mundy, he'd put them aside for the apparent good of the case.

"Him." Alison pointed to the left of 'Marion'. "He's called Gaz. In his twenties. Dark brown skin. Brown eyes. He's shaved his head. He was coming out of a club near the river. He never saw what hit him. Grady was next." Alison stepped almost to the end of the hearth pointing as she continued to make introductions. "He's in his 30's. Tall. Your height, Sherlock. He's blond. He has a souvenir stall.

"Then Alina. She'd just come over from Gdansk. Only been in London a month. She's a sturdy-looking girl. She works out. She has black hair and she wears it in plaits." Alison pointed to a spot midway down her back. "She was going to go to university." Alison started to walk away and then she turned toward the hearth again. "Wait. Pull back your shirt. Show me." She peered forward, apparently at Alina's chest.

"All of you. Show me. Show me your tattoos." One by one Alison looked closely at the others. It was a remarkable pantomime. "They all have roses." she said. "A few of them have others, but the roses are fresh. The most recent, I mean."

"Their killers pick them like flowers," John murmured. "Sherlock, could that be the link?"

Sherlock snatched the notepad and pen from John's hands. He thrust them into Alison's. "Draw. As precisely as you can. I need to see."

* * *

It was late and Alison was exhausted. Sherlock had kept her bent over the pad and pen until she had copied each tattoo precisely, down to the last shaded thorn and petal. He had made her stare at each of the murder victims and describe them as he sketched, correcting his artwork until he had five fair likenesses. All she wanted to do is put her head against the padded backrest and sleep until the taxi finally delivered her to her hotel. But she wasn't alone. John had been tasked with escorting her to her temporary home and this was the first opportunity she'd had to find out why he seemed to regard her with such antipathy.

"I'm no different than you," she said, feeling defensive, although she wasn't sure why she felt she needed to justify herself to a stranger. Maybe it was her inherent dislike of doctors that had her back up. The need to prove to them that she wasn't mental like so many of them believed her to be. "I'm just trying to help people."

"Dead people," John muttered.

"And you and Sherlock have never helped the dead?" Alison asked sharply. "He solves murders! He finds the thieves who steal people's lives!"

"That's different." There was a dogged resoluteness in John's voice. As if he couldn't bear to compare what he and Sherlock did with Alison's interactions with the dead.

"How? How its it different, John?" Alison was letting her temper get the better of her. She knew it. She also knew that she would get nowhere as long as she kept snapping. She drew a calming breath and let it out again before trying to explain further.

"They come to me, just like I came to you, because they need help and I can give it to them. Death doesn't end people's suffering, John. Or is that what bothers you? Because you're a doctor and that's what you tell grieving families. 'Your love one has passed. Their suffering is over.' and now you know that's not necessarily true?"

John didn't reply. He just stared out the window and tracked their journey's progress through the quiet streets. Alison realised she'd struck a nerve. "What they say," she said softly, "it's true. The reason the dead linger. It's usually unfinished business. Sometimes, it's theirs; controlling types who can't believe the people they leave behind can do without them. You'd be surprised at the number of dead middle managers I see in office buildings, still beavering away at their desks."

She smiled to help put the joke over. John gave her a humourless courtesy smile in return. It wasn't much, but it was a start, so Alison forged ahead, sobering as she continued to explain.

"More often though, it's the families that can't let go. Their grief is so strong that it binds the spirit of their loved one to them so they can't pass over. That's why I do seances like the one tonight. The people who I was with, Samuel and Alma Buhari, were out of the country visiting relatives in Nigeria when their daughter Alicia went into labour prematurely. She died giving birth. The Buharis were devastated. What was meant to be the happiest of occasions, the birth of their first grandchild, turned into the one of the worst. They had to come home and bury their youngest child instead."

Alison looked into John's eyes. She might of imagined it, but she thought she saw the first signs that he might be softening towards her.

"That's why I call the dead back from the other side. For the families, it's a sort of therapy. They get the assurances they need so they can let go and grieve properly."

"And these other people you see." It looked like it was costing John dearly to open his mind enough to ask the question. "The ones like Sherlock's uncle?"

It always does come back to Sherlock, Alison thought. She was reminded of Sherrinford Holmes's comment about John's protective nature in regard to his nephew. She shrugged. "Sometimes, it's the living who genuinely worry the dead. In Sherlock's case, I take it he went off the rails for a bit? Enough so that Sherrinford couldn't bring himself to cross over. Not as long as Sherlock was at risk."

John seemed uncertain as he took Alison's explanation in. "And that stuff at the reading about 'the Irish lad'? What did that mean? It sounded as if he and Sherlock had crossed swords before."

Alison looked out the taxicab window. She saw the café where her morning's adventure had begun and realised they were only a short distance from the hotel. "I can't explain exactly. It's not something I completely understand myself. You've heard the term 'soul mate'?"

John nodded.

"It's not just about romantic love. I've been told by people who understand more about reincarnation than I do, that souls who recognise one another react. Sometimes positively. Sometimes negatively. Depending on the circumstances, when they do meet, they may try and pick up where they left off. I had the feeling that Sherrinford was referring to something like that." Alison paused her explanation. "I'm sorry, it feels odd referring to someone so abstractly. Does this 'Irish lad' have a name? Sherrinford never said."

John hesitated. It was clear he knew, but didn't want to share. Whoever it was, it was someone he didn't like. Not in the least bit, if his expression was anything to go by.

Alison shrugged. It wasn't any of her business, this conflict. And she'd just as soon stay clear of anything that was going to complicate the already tenuous relationship she had with John and Sherlock. "That's all right. If you're more comfortable this way, I don't need to know."

"You're saying they're soul mates?" John sounded faintly incredulous at the notion.

Alison shrugged. The entire situation was being explained to her in vague references that she couldn't quite make sense of, even if she had the right sort of experience to offer an educated opinion. Soul mates, despite their popularity in fiction, were a fairly rare occurrence. "It's possible. Maybe it was a situation that was thrust upon them," she suggested. "Some long ago shaman or ancient priest tied their fates together for reasons that have been lost to time."

In broad terms, the explanation made sense. Alison had seen strange and terrible things happen when dead souls became fixated on living people or visa versa. There was no reason she could see that two living souls couldn't be similarly chained. "Whatever was intended, it had consequences beyond that lifetime. There's an unhealthy fascination that worries Sherlock's uncle. He knows Sherlock can't resist this other person now that they've met up again."

Her explanation didn't seem to sit well with John at all. He seemed perturbed by it. "An unhealthy fascination," he murmured. "That sounds about right."

The taxi slowed and finally rolled to a stop. John got out and helped Alison over the kerb. "I'm not saying I believe any of this," he said as he escorted her to the door and stood by as Alison fished her key out of her handbag. "But if I did, is there anything that can be done to … short circuit this soul bond?"

Alison finally found the big old-fashioned brass front door key in the bottom of her bag. She shook her head. "As I explained, John, this isn't something I know very much about, but I get the impression that it's up to the bonded to break the cycle. They have to find a way to resolve the issue that brought them together in the first place. Until then, their souls will be caught in an endless loop until Time itself ends their meetings."

For a moment John's perturbed expression became heart-sickened and then he blanked his face. Alison had to swallow over an unanticipated lump in her throat as she felt a commiserating pang of sorrow for a man who she barely knew, and up to that point, hadn't really cared for. "It might not be as bad as I'm making it sound. As I said, what happens to the souls after they crossover really isn't my area of expertise."

John shrugged rather helplessly, neither agreeing or dissenting with Alison, before he got back into the taxi and motored away.

* * *

Jack took a swipe at the alarm clock. It was new and he had already grown to loathe the appalling loud, rattling buzzing sound it made when it went off. He added 'get another new alarm clock' to his list of things to do as he unplugged the one that was tormenting him and then chucked it into the bin on the way to the bathroom.

Feeling marginally more human after a shower and shave, he dressed for work. It was not until he'd had his first, fortifying cup of coffee did he scroll through the the messages that had come in whilst he slept the restless sleep of one no longer used to sleeping alone.

At 2am, according to the time stamp, Sherlock Holmes had sent a text.

With a feeling that his day was about to get considerably more complex, Jack opened the message.

_Congratulations! We have serial killers! Search the missing persons database for people matching the following descriptions. (Details appended.) - SH._

Jack scanned the list. Five victims in total, probably going back five years. The first names of two more men and and two women – each with a list of fragmentary details and a pencil sketch – but no discernible links between them other than their tattoos. It was the sort of case that could make or break a career and it was all his, right up until the point he yielded to proper procedure and kicked it upstairs to the Detective Chief Inspector so that he could turn around and present it to the Chief Super.

But how could he?

Jack imagined walking into DCI Sullivan's office and laying out a case that was based on the evidence of an out-of-town medium with a sketchy history, whose story was backed up by London's most eccentric private investigator, and cringed. He was already skating on thin ice as far as Sullivan was concerned. Sullivan was a box-ticking martinet and he had little tolerance for detective sergeants who let their deteriorating personal lives get in the way of the timely filing of their paperwork. There was no reason to give him more ammunition to fuel his ambition to transfer Jack off the murder squad. It would be better to quietly follow up the new evidence and then, and only then, if it became something tenable, would he show it to the DCI.

With a plan of action firmly in hand, Jack breakfasted with a hearty appetite on cold pizza, filled a couple of used pillowslips with dirty clothes to take to the laundrette, and headed for the office.

* * *

"John, we need milk. Be a good fellow and pop out and get some will you? We're expecting company."

When John had returned in the small hours of the morning from escorting Alison back to her hotel, Sherlock had already retreated to his mind palace, which meant they couldn't discuss what had transpired. Now he was doing a fair imitation of a Wodehouse toff or possibly Mycroft, reclining at ease in his chair as he scanned the morning papers. John scowled with menace before going to the kitchen to see if there was any coffee.

He hadn't slept well and was in a dark mood. Every time he'd shut his eyes and managed to drift off, it had been into the same weird dream; Sherlock and Moriarty, lifetime after lifetime, squaring off in a new round of their endless fascination, while he looked on helplessly, unable to compel Sherlock to do something that would break the cycle once and for all.

On the counter there was no sign of coffee or any other caffeinated beverage, but there was milk in the fridge. At least enough to get through breakfast. He took the bottle and waved it in Sherlock's face. "What do you call this?"

"An adequate amount for tea," Sherlock replied, "but not nearly enough for the strung out heroin addict who should be knocking on our door in approximately fifteen minutes time. I need her reasonably coherent. So if you don't mind?" He looked up at John expectantly.

John sighed, but nodded. Given the circumstances, there were worse things Sherlock could expect him to procure. "I won't be long."

It was much too early for Speedy's to be open so John hastened down the street to the market. He bought twice their normal requirement of milk, a large packet of frosted chocolate doughnuts, and as an afterthought, some bananas, before hurrying back to 221B for his still longed for cup of coffee.

The kettle had just gone when there was a knock at the door. Voices floated up the stairwell. Mrs Hudson sounded rather dubious, but she let their callers in anyway. "There's two people to see you, Sherlock," she called from the entryway.

A few moments later they were ushered in. John recognised Reg from the towpath, but he'd never seen his companion, a young woman with a tired face and ancient eyes. She held herself tightly, mostly because she was trying to keep her hands still. Like Reg, she wore a heavy jacket that was unseasonably warm. He wasn't an expert, but it was obvious even to a first year medical student, that the woman was hurting for a fix. "Come sit down. I'll get you some breakfast."

He saw them to the sofa and then went to the kitchen. When he came out again, bearing a tray with tea for Reg and a plate of doughnuts and a large glass of milk for the still yet to be introduced informant, he could feel Sherlock's impatience burning on the air, but there wasn't anything that he could do about that. The woman was strung out. Until the palliative measures kicked in she wouldn't be of any use to anyone.

"You have some information for me?" Sherlock asked after tense minutes had passed.

Reg nodded. "This is Josie. She … um ... works ... the area down by the towpath."

The woman nodded. She shuffled around in the pockets of her jacket and pulled out a wad of tissues. She blew her nose and rubbed at her eyes. "There was a car hanging around a couple of weeks back. Thought it was strange, cos it's one I know. Use t' see it sometimes over near me squat. The council's knockin' it all down soon. Ugly things they were, but we called 'm home. Don't know where I'll doss now."

"How do you know it's the car we're looking for?" John asked.

"Same day I got popped for solicitin', wasn't it," Josie replied. "Gave me an ASBO and a fierce tellin' off. Girl remembers somethin' like that, don't she."

It sounded tenuous at best, but tenuous was better than nothing, which is what they had before. "What did the car look like," John asked with his pen poised over his notepad.

"Faded silver Astra," Josie replied from behind her wad of tissue. "Wing on the driver's side is bashed in. Paint's all scratched from being keyed."

"Number plate?" Sherlock asked. "Year of the car?"

"Sorry." Josie shook her head and then ate another doughnut.

When she was finished, John handed over the pad and pen. With a trembling hand, Josie sketched out a rough map of where the suspect car had occasionally been seen, and then she and Reg got up to leave.

As they escorted the pair to the door, John watched as Sherlock handed Josie a wad of cash. "You realise that's going straight into her arm," he said when the front door had swung shut.

Sherlock shrugged. "Other people's vices are not mine to police, John. But as it happens, in this case you're most certainly wrong. Josie is on her way to court-mandated rehab. Whether it does her any good or not is yet to be determined." He appeared to dismiss the matter from his mind as his attention was diverted to the map in his hands. "Get onto the Canley council website, John, and see what they have to say on the subject of redevelopment."

John retrieved his laptop from under a pile of unopened letters and logged onto the Internet. "Sherlock, it says in two days they're scheduled to start demolition."

"That won't make SOCO happy," Sherlock commented dryly, as if he appreciated a challenge, even if they didn't.

Despite the tenuousness of the case or maybe because of it, John felt keenly the pressure of a clock ticking its way down to zero. Valuable evidence would be lost to the wrecking ball if they didn't move fast. "So what do we do?" he asked. "Do we get Alison Mundy and see if the building gets a thumbs up from the ghosts or should we go to Sergeant Martella and show him the new evidence, even if it is circumstantial?"

Sherlock pulled his mobile from the pocket of his dressing gown and contemplated its face. "Both, I think. I sent the partial descriptions Alison supplied us with last night to Martella in the early hours of the morning. Unwilling to go to his superiors with a case constructed of half-facts and suppositions, he will have queried the missing persons database himself. By now he will have the case files on his desk and he'll be wondering how best to explain how he came to investigate the matter in the first place, considering all of the disappearances are relatively low priority enquiries. I think a murder scene might help him considerably, don't you?" He glanced at John and gave him a thin-lipped smile. "As for Alison Mundy, since she's the one who instigated the affair, I think it's only fitting that she be there for the finish."

While he supposed Sherlock had a point, finding the bodies would hardly be the end of the case. A pair of serial murderers were still on the loose, and who knew when they would kill again? "But this won't be the finish," John pointed out.

Sherlock shrugged out of his dressing gown and dropped it carelessly onto the chair. "No. But once we verify the scene, it will become a criminal investigation, with all the accompanying pantomime, and our presence will no longer be welcome. Besides, I'm sure with the mountain of evidence obtainable at a serial murder scene that someone as eager to redeem his professional reputation in front of his superior officers as DS Martella is will be able to run down the killers and secure a conviction without my help." He looked up expectantly at John. "Shall we go?"

* * *

Jack was plenty used to being summoned, but it was generally by his DCI and not by the likes of someone like Sherlock Holmes. They were gathered around a table in a café not far from what the detective claimed was the making of Jack's professional career. Comprising their merry band was Holmes' constant companion John Watson, Alison Mundy, who didn't seem any less off than the first time Jack had clapped eyes on her, and a no-nonsense woman by the name of Jane Hanley, who was the demolition superintendent for the latest redevelopment project in the borough of Canley. It was the council's intention to renovate a mostly disused block of shops with flats over them and turn them into a new and improved block of shops with flats over them. The new design boasted of central heating units and other mod cons, and whilst Jack was not one to argue with progress, he thought the new design rather generically modern. It lacked the architectural whimsy of its Victorian predecessor.

DC Denali and four plain-clothes constables sat at the next table. Jack had borrowed the constables off a 'data collating task force' and the four looked as if they were glad of it as they drank tea and ate sandwiches whilst awaiting further instructions.

He glanced at his watch. It was time to get the show, as it were, on the road. "Mr Holmes?"

John Watson unrolled a map of the demolition site and held it down with condiment containers. Holmes pointed a long, elegantly sculpted finger at their objective. "We're going there." He looked up at Jack as if to say, 'There. Satisfied?'

It had seemed prudent to Jack to notify the council of their preliminary sortie onto the presumptive crime scene. He didn't want some over-enthusiastic demolition crew taking the building down around their ears because they'd decided to advance their timetable to head off a last minute injunction. He'd insisted that they notify the council of their intentions.

"You'll need hard hats," Hanley said. "And proper shoes. And you'll need to sign this waiver." She produced a sheaf of documents from her handbag. "I'm not sticking my neck out for a liability claim."

Holmes rolled his eyes. Jack snatched a pen out of his breast pocket and scrawled his name on the document without reading it.

Alison Mundy picked at a currant bun nervously.

Formalities concluded, Jack rose from his seat. It was time to see if his career was to be made or if he was about to be made a laughingstock. The talk of ghosts and spirits made him think of his aunt Viv. Hopefully she, and a cadre of other fallen coppers, was watching out for him as they made their way down the street to the entry point of the redevelopment site.

* * *

The voices started as soon as they approached the chain link barricade. Alison looked around and spotted the ghosts. All five of them were standing on the other side of the fence, looking at the living with a collectively anxious expression. It was a significant moment. They knew that once their bodies were discovered that their families' uncertainty over their fates would be ended. It was their first step on the journey to freedom.

She adjusted her hard hat. They hadn't bothered with steel-toed shoes, but knowing their destination, Alison had worn a pair of sturdy trainers, which she hoped would be up to the task. They weren't meant to tarry on-site. All she had to do is find the place where Declan and the others had met their ends and then get out again. They didn't want to unnecessarily contaminate the crime scene, DS Martella explained. They didn't want to risk blowing the conviction of suspects they'd yet to put names to.

Declan beckoned them forward. Alison followed as the ghosts, their arms wrapped around one another in a consoling manner, walked resolutely towards a boarded up pub.

"This way," she said to the men who had brought her. "They're here."

DS Martella strode forward. The doors to all the businesses had been chained, but squatters and protesters, not keen on the redevelopment, had cut the chains in an act of civil disobedience. Someone had tied the broken chain around the door handles in a futile attempt to make the point that the council would not be swayed. He untied the heavy links and let them fall to the ground. "Gloves and shoe protectors from this point out."

Sherlock pulled an irritated face. John touched his friend's sleeve and shook his head in reply. They silently engaged in what looked like an old argument before Sherlock huffed out a breath and put the disposable blue shoe covers on. He gave John a look that seemed to say, 'satisfied?' which was returned by one that said, 'Just try to get along.' and then they both looked at her to see if she was coming.

Alison nodded and drew a resolute breath. She hated crime scenes. It wasn't just the after-images echoing past tragedies. It was the ghosts. They were unpredictable. Sometimes their anger made them violent. Sometimes they refused to give into their fates and they possessed the living, creating new horrors. "We're here to help you," she said softly, just in case the spirits needed a reminder. She snapped on her gloves and followed the men inside.

The pub wasn't empty. Faded spirits sat along the bar and in the booths, supping pints from barrels that had been long emptied. She felt eyes upon her. Alison dragged her attention away from the old soldiers and the Victorian gentlemen and homed in on the source of the watched feeling. DS Martella was looking at her expectantly. Alison gave herself a mental shake and sought out Declan and the rest. She couldn't see them, but she could feel a restless, impatient energy building. A frustration that the living weren't working fast enough.

A door at the back of the room blew open and slammed against the wall.

"The hell!" John said as DS Martella flinched visibly.

Sherlock merely seemed intrigued. "I believe they want us to go that way," he said. He looked at Alison, as if he wanted to know if she agreed.

With her heart hammering in her chest, the sudden bang of wood on wood had startled her just as much as the doctor and policeman, Alison nodded.

They adjourned to the office in the back. Another door flew open without warning.

"Do you think they could be a little less – " DS Martella struggled for the right word. " – emphatic?" he finally said.

Alison shrugged. She might be a medium, but she didn't control the spirits. "I can ask," she replied. "Please," she said to the empty air. "We are trying to help."

Sherlock pulled a torch from his pocket. He shone the beam around the newly revealed space. "There's a hatch here." He bent to lift the lid and exposed a staircase. "This way."

They descended, illuminating the way by beams of torchlight, careful not to touch the polished wooden bannister or anything else that might contain fingerprints more than necessary. Nervously, Alison steadied herself against John's shoulder as the tread beneath her foot creaked loudly and threatened to crack.

"Not exactly a garden spot," DS Martella said when they regrouped at the bottom of the stairway. "So where are the bodies do you reckon?"

The images hit Alison all at once. Men and women stripped naked and tied against iron bars, their backs whipped bloody, hanging limply as a man and woman writhed against one another.

She screwed her eyes shut. It didn't help. Alison smelt blood. She felt her arms grasped roughly and dragged into place before they were shackled. She heard the ringing sound of metal striking metal and felt the blinding agony of a spike being driven through her wrist. She screamed.

"Alison!"

From far away Alison heard voices. For a timeless moment she was stuck in a vivid re-enactment of the horrific torture that had been inflicted on Declan and the rest and then she was back among the living, John had her by one arm and DS Martella by the other, supporting her weight. She'd been on the verge of collapsing.

"What did you see?" Sherlock asked briskly. He was being just as hard with her as he had been with the ghosts. His voice cut through her panic like a sharp slap to the face. Alison drew a shaking breath and recounted the vision.

"They were tied to the gate, there." She pointed to a iron-barred lock-up, where at some point in the distant past, a publican had stored the best whiskeys and other hard-to-obtain spirits. "They were stripped and whipped, for the pleasure of the woman who watched. Afterwards … they had sex while the victim hung there, floating in and out of consciousness."

Alison drew another unsteady breath, but indicated that she was all right. Both John and DS Martella let go of her arms, but they stood close by, in case she needed to lean upon them again.

"They were beaten seven times. Gaz kept track. He scratched a mark into the floor in the corner of the lock up."

"And then what?" Sherlock asked.

"They were nailed to a crosspiece." Alison felt another flash of searing pain. She bit back a cry and took a slow breath through her nose to control a wave of nausea. "And hung – " She remembered the torch in her hand and swung the beam against the wall. "– there. Until they died. They suffered days of agonising torment as their captors lost themselves in ecstasy."

"The bodies, Alison," DS Martella asked quietly. "What did they do with the bodies?"

The far end of the room illuminated. One by one the spirits of the victims appeared. Marion. Gaz. Grady. Alina. Declan. They stood above their graves.

"Over there." Alison pointed towards the spirits of the dead. "They're buried there."

Sherlock, with DS Martella in his wake, strode across the stone floor. He shone the beam of his torch at the spot where Declan was buried and then knelt. "This paving stone has been recently moved."

DS Martella knelt as well. He reached forward, almost, but not quite, touching the floor before he caught himself and rose to his feet. "Until we see underneath, it's still circumstantial."

"This isn't." John had gone to the cage where the torture had occurred. He shone the beam of his torch on the ground. "Seven marks." The beam moved and he pointed at the wall. "It's been cleaned in here, but there's still traces of what looks like blood in the mortar."

Sherlock straightened and started to move towards John. He got half-way across the room when he pulled his mobile from his pocket and held it up triumphantly. "I've got more evidence for you, Martella. A car, matching the description of the one my informants say was used in the abductions, has just been spotted in front of a house not far from here. The owners are loading it with personal possessions. It appears they are getting ready to move."

"Damn!" DS Martella strode across the room. Sherlock handed over his mobile. Martella looked at the screen and then handed it back and reached for his own.

"Denali. I'm sending you an address. Get over there and detain the man and the woman who are loading their gear into a beat up Ford Astra. I don't know. Use your initiative. Just do it. Leave a constable to watch their car until we can get a warrant to search it, and get them down to the nick. Right. See you later." He rang off.

"And now the circus begins," Sherlock said.

Alison looked over at the grave sites. One by one the ghosts smiled at her and faded out, confident that justice would be done. John touched her arm, indicating that it was time to go. She smiled at him and followed him up the stairs.

* * *

Sherlock emerged from his bedroom looking tousled but rested. John tipped his head towards a waiting tray of toast and coffee, and then once Sherlock had helped himself, handed over the newspaper he'd already read and discarded.

"Jack Martella is the hero of the hour. Although it apparently cost his DCI dearly to say so." John thought it had been interesting reading between the lines of the Met's prepared statement. It was clear that they weren't exactly pleased to have a free-thinking, protocol-shirking, detective sergeant in their midst. "Apparently, he was instrumental in cracking 'The Roman Ritual Murders'."

Sherlock looked askance at the florid sobriquet. "'The Roman Ritual Murders'? Gunnar Larson and Esme Reynolds had a couple of books and videos about the Roman empire in their flat, so that's what the press decides to call them?" He blew out a breath. "Still, I suppose it's better than, 'the Birthday Rose Killers', or some other drivel. Why the press can't simply report the facts, I'll never know. What's so hard about 'Tattoo parlour receptionist and maintenance worker torture and kill for sexual gratification'?"

John shrugged in reply. "It lacks a certain snap, I suppose. Besides, Larson did tell Martella that's where he got the idea for the crucifixions. The rest though, I'll grant you, that was just their own twisted imaginations. Reynolds picking the victims by their tattoos. Kidnap and murder as a birthday gift? "

"It does show more initiative than a card and a box of chocolates," Sherlock commented around his toast. "I do like DCI Sullivan's massaging of the facts." He quoted from the newspaper article. "'Acting on the tips of observant citizens, we were able to crack a highly unusual serial murder case, capturing the suspects without alarming the public.' What rot! If it'd been up to him, no one would have looked into the disappearances properly and Alison Mundy would be standing before a sanity hearing. Idiot!"

"Poor woman." John realised he no longer had any doubts about Alison's strange abilities. "I can't decide if what she can do is a gift or a curse."

"No doubt it's a question she's asked herself," Sherlock said. "Seeing those the rest of us cannot has certainly caused her no small measure of grief. Still, in this instance, I'm glad she made use of her talent. That was a highly unique case, John. The sort of case we're unlikely to see again."

"Thank God. Sherlock," John said hesitantly. "Your uncle Sherrinford."

Sherlock took a sip of his coffee. "What about him?" he replied guardedly.

John felt a complete tit, but he drew a breath and pressed on. "I asked Alison about what he'd said, about Moriarty, I mean, at the theatre."

"And?"

"She said you have an 'eternal fascination'. That you're locked in a repeating loop. And until one of you finds a way to break the cycle, you'll keep meeting up, lifetime after lifetime."

Sherlock seemed to mull the idea over in a way that gave John a sinking feeling. Rather than take the warning for what it was, Sherlock seemed to be warming to the notion. "Interesting."

"You do realise that an eternal nemesis isn't a good thing," John said. "Right?"

Sherlock didn't reply. He finished his coffee and then brightened as he pulled his mobile from his dressing gown pocket. "Excellent!" he said. "The embargo is at an end. Lestrade says they've just pulled a body from the river. He wants us to take a look at it. You haven't got anything interesting on, have you?" He smiled. "Of course you haven't. Pull on your clothes, we'll leave in ten minutes."

With that, Sherlock was off, eager for a new adventure, and it was John who found himself in a brooding mood as he doggedly obeyed the call to action.

/end


End file.
